FTA: Australian scientists who went in search of Sandy Island - which appears midway between Australia and the French-governed New Caledonia on Google Earth among other world maps - found nothing but sea when they arrived.

Luckily I've never seen even a second of the show. I shudder to think how miffed I would have been if I was a fan :(

Some of us enjoyed it just fine and were able to carry on with our lives afterward. It's just a tv show after all. Oh sorry I forgot this was the Internet. I guess I should be outraged about how Lindelof raped my 30s or something.

I woke up this morning with a bad hangoverAnd my island was missing again.This happens all the time.It's detachable.

This comes in handy a lot of the time.I can baffle geologists, when I think it's gonna be hilarious,or I can rent it out, when I don't need it.But now and then I go to a party, get drunk,and the next morning I can't for the life of meremember what I did with it.First I looked around my apartment, and I couldn't find it.So I called up the place where the party was,they hadn't seen it either.I asked them to check the medicine cabinet'cause for some reason I leave it there sometimesBut not this time.So I told them if it pops up to let me know.I called a few people who were at the party,but they were no help either.I was starting to get desperate.I really don't like being without my island for too long.It makes me feel like less of a planet,and I really hate having to move the tectonic plates without no islands to sink.After a few hours of searching the house,and calling everyone I could think of,I was starting to get very depressed,so I went to the Sun, and ate breakfast.Then, as I walked down Venus towards Mars,where all those planets orbit around the Sun,I saw my island lying on a blanketnext to a broken pastry company called Hostess.Some guy was selling it.I had to buy it off him.He wanted twenty-two bucks, but I talked him down to seventeen.I took it home, washed it off,and put it back on. I was happy again. Complete.Planets sometimes tell me I should get it permanently attached,but I don't know.Even though sometimes it's a pain in the ass,I like having a detachable island.

davidphogan:They build in fake streets/etc to throw off copyright infringers. Why not an island?

Ugh. Rand McNally messed around with some rural roads in Maine on the edge of my NB map. Basically the interface between I-95 and the secondary highway that heads through Hanwell to Fredericton (if anybody cares). It actually put an offshoot rural road on the wrong side of the river (which was my first hint that something was wrong with the map), among other non-trivial obfuscations (right at the fork instead of the left indicated by the map) that made finding the goddamn highway much harder than it should have been.

It's really quite clear, if you pay attention. It's actually alljust a dream. Cut footage show the main protagonist jolting upright out of a fitful sleep in his seat just before takeoff of his flight...

I woke up this morning with a bad hangoverAnd my island was missing again.This happens all the time.It's detachable.

This comes in handy a lot of the time.I can baffle geologists, when I think it's gonna be hilarious,or I can rent it out, when I don't need it.But now and then I go to a party, get drunk,and the next morning I can't for the life of meremember what I did with it.First I looked around my apartment, and I couldn't find it.So I called up the place where the party was,they hadn't seen it either.I asked them to check the medicine cabinet'cause for some reason I leave it there sometimesBut not this time.So I told them if it pops up to let me know.I called a few people who were at the party,but they were no help either.I was starting to get desperate.I really don't like being without my island for too long.It makes me feel like less of a planet,and I really hate having to move the tectonic plates without no islands to sink.After a few hours of searching the house,and calling everyone I could think of,I was starting to get very depressed,so I went to the Sun, and ate breakfast.Then, as I walked down Venus towards Mars,where all those planets orbit around the Sun,I saw my island lying on a blanketnext to a broken pastry company called Hostess.Some guy was selling it.I had to buy it off him.He wanted twenty-two bucks, but I talked him down to seventeen.I took it home, washed it off,and put it back on. I was happy again. Complete.Planets sometimes tell me I should get it permanently attached,but I don't know.Even though sometimes it's a pain in the ass,I like having a detachable island.

What is that image from? I ask because an historically accurate 8-course lute is a rare thing to see in modern media.

/Classical Guitar geek//Never watched Lost///I get annoyed at how fantasy illustrators and comic book artists rarely seem to take the time to find out what the instrument actually looked like.////It's not like the aren't lots of contemporary examples, many of which are considered to be textbook study's in perspective drawing.//SLASHES

There will be conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theorists seem to get their theories from old movies, SF books, and TV shows for the most part any way, so a disappearing island is too much to resist.

But folklore, mythology and even history is full of islands and other magical places that disappear.

You've got your Atlantis (everywhere), Brigadoon (Scotland), several British islands that come and go mysteriously, Hy Brazil, the Land of the Promise of the Saints, islands that turn out to be whales or sea monsters when you light a fire on them, the Lost Continent of Mu, Sinbad's Island, and so forth. Both Alaska and California were islands on some early maps. And there are real islands that rise and fall like the one in Terry Pratchett's Jingo.

Any number of SF and spy movie islands vanish beneath the waves with their mysterious treasures and mad men. The sea is full of wandering islands also, starting with the famous Island of Delos, which is what I am going to name my supertanker-sized yacht when I get a few billion to build it.

Remember how Atlantis goes down in Erik the Viking? And the hubris which caused the sinking of the Fabled Lost City of Atlanta, Much More Than a Delta Hub and a Coke bottling plant?

Conspiracy theories are dull and implausible compared to folklore. Even H.P. Lovecraft was based on his solid reading of ancient myths and literature. Without the mythical touch, conspiracy is so much easier to explain by politics as usual that it must constantly morph and swallow every idiotic speculation or jest or die.

Clearly this is the island of the Roc or else some super-government secret research centre designed to bore us to death with tails of top secret technologies quashed by the very people who would be made super-rich and super-powerful for real if they brought them to market.

What is that image from? I ask because an historically accurate 8-course lute is a rare thing to see in modern media.

/Classical Guitar geek//Never watched Lost///I get annoyed at how fantasy illustrators and comic book artists rarely seem to take the time to find out what the instrument actually looked like.////It's not like the aren't lots of contemporary examples, many of which are considered to be textbook study's in perspective drawing.//SLASHES

I woke up this morning with a bad hangoverAnd my island was missing again.This happens all the time.It's detachable.

This comes in handy a lot of the time.I can baffle geologists, when I think it's gonna be hilarious,or I can rent it out, when I don't need it.But now and then I go to a party, get drunk,and the next morning I can't for the life of meremember what I did with it.First I looked around my apartment, and I couldn't find it.So I called up the place where the party was,they hadn't seen it either.I asked them to check the medicine cabinet'cause for some reason I leave it there sometimesBut not this time.So I told them if it pops up to let me know.I called a few people who were at the party,but they were no help either.I was starting to get desperate.I really don't like being without my island for too long.It makes me feel like less of a planet,and I really hate having to move the tectonic plates without no islands to sink.After a few hours of searching the house,and calling everyone I could think of,I was starting to get very depressed,so I went to the Sun, and ate breakfast.Then, as I walked down Venus towards Mars,where all those planets orbit around the Sun,I saw my island lying on a blanketnext to a broken pastry company called Hostess.Some guy was selling it.I had to buy it off him.He wanted twenty-two bucks, but I talked him down to seventeen.I took it home, washed it off,and put it back on. I was happy again. Complete.Planets sometimes tell me I should get it permanently attached,but I don't know.Even though sometimes it's a pain in the ass,I like having a detachable island.

First thing I thought of, glad someone is better at writing than me. Bravo sir!